Truth & Consequences

OR

Why Illya Eschews Indiscriminate Intimacy

Two weeks had passed since The Slap Heard 'Round the World. Illya stood outside Dr. Amelia Prescott's door and rapped resolutely. One blue eye peeked through the hole,

One slender arm drew him inside.

They stood three feet and seven years apart.

Dr. Prescott broke the silence. "Dr. Nick Curry, I presume."

"It's Illya Kuryakin," he corrected gently.

"Now."

"Amy… we need to talk."

"And we sure as hell can't meet in public."

"I've thought of you…"he began. "Wondered…"

"Well, you're still with UNCLE, I'm still in Purgatory. Nice catching up –" she pushed him back towards the door and he barely resisted.

"Amy, I am so very sorry." His contrition earned him a step and a half closer to her. She turned her back and walked to the serviceable kitchen. "It was quite a shock to wake up to your 'tender ministrations' in Medical."

"For both of us," she agreed. " You went west, I went east."

"And we rendezvous here."

"Had to happen," she shrugged.

"That was not your opinion at the time," he reminded her. "How is Neal?"

Her eyes studied the wall behind him. "You'd have to ask the current Mrs. Prescott."

"I'm sorry, Amy. Truly. I thought—I read about a reconciliation…"

"Don't believe everything you read."

"Because of us-me?" Stupid question. "I knew your circumstances. I was wrong to pursue you."

The Doctors Prescott were not a part of his undercover mission. He knew Neal casually through departmental meetings at the medical center where he had been assigned. He met Amelia in the research lab. She was not even his type, really, he reflected. She was…an opportunity. Merely available, with minimum emotional investment on his part. Divertissement.

"And I could have said no." She broke their mutual gaze and glanced down at her naked hands. The tan no longer displayed a ring line around her finger. "How have you —no, let me guess. You've been fine. You're always fine."

"Disappointed?"

"I am very gratified that you're functional. There were times—" a short shudder twitched her shoulders. It did not go unnoticed. "Care for some wretched coffee to make this reunion even more awkward?" She cranked on the burner before he answered and already set two mugs on the counter. Illya took it as a sign that he was permitted to sit and stay, at least for the duration of the brewing.

"Yes, thank you." It was worse than he had imagined. So stilted; formal as if the passion of the affair had exploded and important pieces of themselves were scattered and missing.

Amelia stared flat into his once-dear face. "I broke sacred vows. I deceived a man who had been nothing but kind and honest to me. I abandoned my child. I disgraced my profession." She recited a litany she had practiced over many sleepless nights.

Surely she would shatter into a thousand slivers of glass if he touched her. He reached out regardless. His lips were well-acquainted with casual lies and convenient kisses. "Stella?"

"She's at school. Montreal. Far from her mother's immoral influence." Illya understood her bitterness, and its direction at him. Amy had loved her child fiercely. A bright and lovely little girl, he had met her several times. Once, most untimely and unfortunately.

The marriage had been stable but stale. Dr. Neal Prescott had been so damaged by their affair, he insisted the child testify at the hearing.

"Doctor Curry was tangled in the covers with Mummy. They were wrestling. Then they hugged and kissed all over and I knew it was ok because loving is good and fighting is bad."

If only the legal system had shared the little girl's instincts. The divorce was granted without financial consideration. Full custody awarded to Prescott. A medical ethics hearing followed, and Amelia's license was suspended for 18 months.

Kuryakin discovered he could still read her mind. Where were YOU, her eyes charged, when my life was destroyed? Where was your passion, your promises, when I had nothing, when I needed you?

"Curry's" orders had changed abruptly and he had been yanked from Amy and the scandal in London. UNCLE's assignment had taken him across the globe for months, kept him incommunicado. When the mission completed, Illya made efforts to track his lover through the tabloid coverage, but she had buried herself in another life. She joined an international healing co-op where the victims she stitched and splinted did not know nor care with whom she shared her bed. It was intense trauma training. It was where Waverly had discovered and recruited her.

Napoleon sometimes speculated about his partner's romantic reticence. Probably his dark deprived childhood in Russia. Or his natural introverted fatalism. Perhaps the military training that forbid him to ever relax or trust.

But more than Solo ever imagined, there had been a "harmless fling." And the truth was, the consequences of that experience haunted the Russian.

Kuryakin could never play at pleasure. The price was too high and it was paid by too many.

finis